Litchfield Advances $23 Million Sewer Overhaul and Approves $112,000 in Emergency Water Plant Repairs

Litchfield City Council Meeting | April 2, 2026

Article Summary: The Litchfield City Council moved forward with massive infrastructure planning for its water and wastewater facilities while approving emergency expenditures to address catastrophic failures at the water treatment plant.

Litchfield Infrastructure Key Points:

• Approved $112,699.03 in emergency repairs for the water plant, including a new PAC silo and security system, waiving competitive bidding.

• CMT Engineering outlined a $22 to $23 million rehabilitation of the aging wastewater treatment plant, targeting state loans and principal forgiveness.

• Water clarifiers have been cleaned and filters rebuilt, leading to immediate and noticeable water quality improvements.

• New 8-inch water lines and a water tower cleaning are underway to address ongoing distribution and quality issues.

The Litchfield City Council on Thursday, April 2, 2026, tackled a series of critical infrastructure hurdles, unanimously approving emergency expenditures for the city’s water treatment plant while previewing a massive $23 million overhaul of the wastewater facility.

The emergency water plant repairs come after what the city’s administration described in agenda documents as a “catastrophic failure of its chemical feed system.” After site visits from both CMT Engineering and HMG Engineering, a voluminous list of immediate corrections was identified.

Alderman Bob Garcia motioned to waive customary bidding procedures to authorize $112,699.03 in emergency fixes. The expenditures include $83,343.00 for a Powered Activated Carbon (PAC) Silo, $4,446.20 for Chlorination and Ammonia Emergency Close Systems, and $24,909.83 for a comprehensive water plant security and access control system to be installed by Heart Technologies.

Christie from CMT Engineering provided an encouraging update on the water plant’s ongoing recovery. A Request for Proposals (RFP) for contract operations is currently out, with vendors touring the facility. Meanwhile, critical deferred maintenance is finally being addressed. Both clarifiers have been completely cleaned out, and the rehabilitation of three filters—comprised of sand and granular activated carbon—is underway.

The results are already visible. “The water after the clarifiers actually had a turbidity that was below the finished water level,” Christie told the council, noting the dramatic reduction of particles in the water. She added that the plant staff’s morale has skyrocketed as they receive proper training on troubleshooting and system functions. “The sense of pride in ownership that’s going on out there is just leaps and bounds from where it was.”

On the distribution side, the city is advancing a $1.5 million water project on the west side of the railroad tracks, funded by a grant, alongside a $2.2 million project to reroute an 8-inch water line on the east side of the lake. A comprehensive cleaning of the water tower is also imminent, which officials hope will further decrease resident complaints regarding water quality.

Simultaneously, the city is racing against the clock to secure funding for a massive overhaul of its wastewater treatment plant, which has reached the end of its extended life. The $22 to $23 million project will heavily focus on replacing deteriorating mechanical components while preserving the structurally sound concrete basins to save costs.

“At a wastewater plant, everything is concrete because the wastewater is corrosive. The structures have like a 50-to-100-year life expectancy. It’s the mechanical components that have that 20-year life expectancy,” Christie explained to the council. “The most economical infrastructure that you have is what you’ve already used and paid for.”

To fund the wastewater overhaul, Litchfield is preparing an application for the State Revolving Fund (SRF) loan program. The city is aggressively pushing to finalize designs and secure necessary construction permits to be placed on the state’s “intended use” list by July 1. Achieving this status is highly competitive but critical, as it opens the door to “principal forgiveness”—the EPA equivalent of grant money based on the city’s median household income.

“We don’t want to lose that principal forgiveness,” Christie emphasized, warning that missing the fiscal cycle could force the city to compete against a different pool of projects the following year with no guarantee of the same financial assistance.

The council will consider an engineering design contract at its next meeting to ensure the project meets the strict state deadlines.